Meet the Spectrum Team

New Patients

NOT ACCEPTING new patients

Our clinic is a full service family practice that offers comprehensive primary medical care and expertise in the management of HIV. At this time the clinic is only able to accommodate referrals for new HIV diagnoses. If you have tested positive for HIV please call the clinic at 604-681-1080 for the first available physician appointment.

Contact Info

Faq

Appointments at Spectrum Health are for registered patients only. You can make an appointment by phoning the clinic at 604-681-1080 or through online booking using the Spectrum Health Patient Portal. You may use online booking to schedule appointments with our nurses, nurse practitioner and your own physician.

All appointments at Spectrum Health are booked/scheduled. There are no walk-in appointments available, with the exception of our scheduled flu-shot clinic in the fall. If you need to be seen same day, please call our front desk staff who will do their best to fit you in with either your doctor, the covering doctor (‘doctor of the day’) if your doctor is away, a nurse or our nurse practitioner.

If you have a health concern arise on an evening or weekend when the clinic is closed and need advice before the clinic reopens, we have a 24-hour urgent care number that will connect you directly to the Spectrum doctor on-call (778-838-6500). If it is an emergency situation please call 911.

The Patient Portal is an online service for booking appointments, viewing lab results and receiving messages from the clinic or your doctor. After setting up a secure account you are able to log in to view any lab results, your doctor may also share with you other results via the Portal including x-ray reports or specialist consultations. You may book online appointments with the nurses, nurse practitioner and your physician through the Portal.

To sign up for a Patient Portal account please see our front desk staff at your next appointment.

Policies

Many services are not paid for/covered by the Medical Services Plan (MSP). Spectrum Health is pleased to provide some of these services free of charge to our patients, including: cryotherapy with liquid nitrogen for hand warts and other benign skin lesions (including skin tags) and phone requests for medication refills from pharmacies. Other services that are not covered by MSP will be charged to the patient directly and can be paid in cash or cheque at the front desk as follows:

Doctor’s note (including sick notes): $20

Short medical form: minimum of $30

Long medical form: minimum of $30

Driver’s Exam & Form: $75

Fitness Exams for Camp, School, Sports etc: $75

Copy of medical chart: $35 *we will be provide a disk with a PDF file of your chart

Transfers of medical chart to your new family physician will be free of charge, given that we receive a written request with your consent from your new family physician.

Under certain circumstances we are able to offer medication refills for patients by telephone, however please note our policy is to take the refill request directly from a patient’s pharmacist. If you are on a regular medication at a stable dose, are unable to see your doctor and require a refill, please ask your pharmacist to phone the clinic to request a refill. Please provide at least 24 hour notice for the request.

Please note there are exceptions – refills for controlled medications (i.e. opioids and medications requiring triplicate prescription pads and benzodiazepines) must be made in person with your physician. Further, if you are requesting refill of a medication you take for the management of a chronic condition, you may be provided only a short prescription if you have not been seen recently in clinic. For example, if you take medications for high blood pressure and have not had your blood pressure monitored recently, you may receive a small refill and asked to book a follow up appointment with your physician.

Prescription of controlled medications including opioids (codeine, oxycodone, oxycontin, hydromorphone etc.), benzodiazepines (lorazepam, clonazepam etc.) and sleeping medications (zopiclone etc.) are coming under increased scrutiny and regulation by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of British Columbia (CPSBC) due to the tragic spike in overdose deaths relating to these medications over the past year in British Columbia.

In June 2016 the CPSBC issued a Professional Standard regarding the prescription of these medications (https://www.cpsbc.ca/files/pdf/PSG-Safe-Prescribing.pdf). All doctors practicing in British Columbia are bound by this Standard which ‘reflects relevant legal requirements and are enforceable under the Health Professions Act, RSBC 1996, c.183 (HPA) and College Bylaws under the HPA’.

Refills for these medications must be made in person with your doctor as a reassessment of your pain and function is required on a regular basis (unless these medications are prescribed in the context of palliative care or cancer management). If you have any questions relating to changes in your medications or the new clinic policies please book an appointment to speak with your doctor.

As a courtesy we do not charge for cancelled appointments. However, if you know that you are unable to make an appointment, even if it is the day of the appointment, we would appreciate if you could call and let our staff know so that another patient who may need to be seen can be fit into that appointment slot.

We understand that circumstances can arise causing late arrivals and do our best to accommodate. If a physician is fully booked up for the day however and you are more than 15 minutes late for your appointment, you may be asked to come back later in the day or rebook for another day. If you are able to phone and let our staff know that you are running late it is appreciated as another patient may be able to be seen early in order to accommodate a late arrival.